Chasing down a cure for lung cancer, one mile at a time

If so, be part of the solution!

The Ride Hard Breathe Easy Team has been hard at work over the past six weeks, deciding how we can do our part to fight lung cancer in 2018. And……drum roll please….the results are in.

As we looked back at what we accomplished last year, we decided on some key principles that determined what we will do this year and beyond and we came to these four things:

Continue to do work with, and for, LCA and BJALCF, two 4-star Charity Navigator organizations

Change the ride from one person (me going across the country) to many people being on the bike during a long “relay” ride

Do more activities throughout the year

Make it easy to manage so many more people can choose to participate, on or off the bike

So what does that include? Glad you asked, and there are four things you can do on the bike. And four things you can do off the bike to help fight lung cancer.

For those who are Born to be Wild and wanna get on a bike!

We will do a long ride (about 2,500 miles over 5 weeks) and many people will ride, doing as a relay. Starts in Philly and goes to NJ, NY, Boston, Columbus, etc.. and we plan to end in DC. People will ride their bike or drive the van for 3, 4, 5 days.

Anyone can create their own “local / mini RHBE” so if a person wants to ride 250 miles over a weekend in CA (or anywhere in the world), go ahead and do it.

We will have a virtual ride in November (Lung Cancer Awareness Month), and anyone can ride a bike (outside, stationery, spinning). Our goal is to do a “Virtual ride across the country” (3600 miles) by adding up everyone’s miles.

Not interested in biking and you do want to help?

Participate in the LCA and BJALCF 5Ks – exact dates will go on the RHBE site.

Contact Congress, and let them know lung cancer needs help and get their commitment. AS we plan our ride, we will share templates from Lung Cancer Alliance of who to contact and how.

Attend the Annual LCA Conference – Date TBD

So, what’s next?

I will host a call in early March where the RHBE Team will lay out our goals, discuss our plans for 2018 and answer any questions. If you want to help, contact me at john@rhbe.org and we will find a way that you can be a part.

And if you aren’t sure yet, no sweat. Join the call in March and decide then. The information about the call will be in the next blog and on Facebook.

And one final thought..

Last year, we began this journey with a few people helping and creating some vague ideas on what to do. Not sure which direction to go, no route, no bike.

And we finished by raising over $93,000. In addition, we were on television three times, in the media a dozen more times, paid daily tributes 52 times and brought together over 1,000 people who donated, helped and followed us. Those daily tributes touched so many of you, and they inspired me each and every day to give what I can in memory of my Amazing Mom.

So I invite all 1,000+ of you to again be a part of Ride Hard Breathe Easy. Ride, drive, donate, share, spin, help, whatever. Lung cancer patients and their families need us, and I am so excited to see what we will accomplish again this year, as we continue to chase down a cure for lung cancer.